Film festival programme announced

This year's London Film Festival will open with the world premiere of The Fantastic Mr Fox, organisers have confirmed.

The Fantastic Mr Fox was made at the Three Mills Studios in London

George Clooney and Meryl Streep - who voice characters in the animated comedy - are expected at the event on 14 October.

Clooney will also be seen in the flesh in military satire The Men Who Stare at Goats and the comedy Up in the Air.

The 48-year-old will be among a host of stars at the festival, which runs until 29 October.

The Fantastic Mr Fox is director Wes Anderson's new take on the classic story by much-loved children's author Roald Dahl.

The movie, made at London's Three Mills Studios, uses stop-motion animation in which inanimate objects are photographed a frame at a time.

Gala screenings

The festival will close with Nowhere Boy - a drama about the early life of Beatle John Lennon that marks the feature debut of British artist Sam Taylor-Wood.

The full programme was unveiled on Wednesday at a press launch in central London.

Festival closer Nowhere Boy is a drama about the early life of John Lennon

New films from Steven Soderbergh, Ang Lee and Joel and Ethan Coen are among the 146 UK premieres featured in the line-up.

The event will also showcase the first UK screening of a new 3D version of Toy Story 2. The 3D version of the first instalment will already be in cinemas by then.

The White Ribbon, winner of the Palme d'Or at Cannes, is among several titles to receive gala screenings.

Others include Jane Campion's Bright Star, about the poet John Keats, and The Road, an adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel that had its world premiere last week at the Venice Film Festival.

London will also celebrate the 20th anniversary of Wallace and Gromit with a career interview with their creator, animator Nick Park.

'The great and the good'

For the first time the festival will also bestow a best film award, to be decided by a high-profile jury, whose members are yet to be announced.

Speaking about the 2009 programme, artistic director Sandra Hebron paid tribute to the number of so-called auteurs involved.

"One of the things that characterises the selection is there are a lot of films from the great and the good amongst the world's significant filmmakers."

Guests at Wednesday's launch were shown a 30-minute compilation of excerpts from this year's line-up.

Actor David Morrissey, whose directorial debut Don't Worry About Me will be showcased at the festival, said he felt a "surge of emotion" as his name was projected on the Odeon Leicester Square's screen.

The Liverpool-born star, recently seen on the BBC's Doctor Who, also appears in Nowhere Boy alongside Kristin Scott Thomas and Anne-Marie Duff.

New funding from the UK Film Council will enable a stand-alone awards ceremony to be held on the penultimate night of the festival.

"There is a desire within the industry for London to give a best film award," said Sandra Hebron.

"But we are not aiming to have a part of the festival which is for competition, which is what you get in a festival like Venice or Cannes."